Boat Rocker Media
The Worst Possible Game: Maki Naro and Matthew Francis’ “Are We Living In A Computer Simulation?”
Artist Maki Naro teams up with writer (and physicist) Matthew R. Francis for his latest comic for The Nib, which explores the the age-old question: Is reality real? Elon Musk–CEO of SpaceX and Tesla Motors, leader of various interesting projects, and full time public futurist–recently made the case for philosopher Nick Bostrom’s simulation argument. Bostrom says that a sufficiently advanced society could run an ancestor simulation that would be indistinguishable from real reality and maybe already is. Musk takes this a step further to argue that, hey, maybe, probably we’re already living in one of these simulations. In Are We Living In A Computer Simulation? Naro examines the possibility that we’re all background characters in the Nolan brothers’ most complicated film yet and why that idea fascinates so many futurists and tech leaders. (more…)
In Defence of Waiting: SimCity BuildIt and Two Dots Can Last Forever
SimCity is the only game franchise that’s posed a credible threat to my life. (Not really, but work with me, people.) I was thirteen, I had cheat codes, paper route savings to provide me with candy, and far too much time on my hands. Thirteen–also the number of hours I played it, each day, until I finally cracked, burned my city to the ground, and moved on with my life, playing SimCity only in more reasonable chunks.
I’m playing SimCity again and this time waiting is built into the game. SimCity BuildIt is a free-to-play app game. It replaces the more traditional SimCity game that EA had developed for mobile, found less than monkey-making, and removed from app stores. (more…)

Adobe Withdraws Accidental Support of #GamerGate
Last week — JFC, was it only last week?! — Adobe accidentally endorsed GamerGate. Or at least, they appeared to be endorsing GamerGate, thanks to a misunderstanding on the part of Adobe’s social media team and some pretty impressive spin from GamerGaters.
Shocking Twist: Data Show #GamerGate Is About Harassing Women
According to objective data, #GamerGate is not about journalistic ethics. Colour me surprised.
Newsweek had Brandwatch analyze 25% of tweets to the GamerGate hashtag. The social media analytics firm looked at 500,000 tweets, going back to the inception of the hashtag. They found that the vast majority of tweets were directed to female developers and game critics, not journalists:
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